


Pthumerian Barbecue

by garylovesjohn



Category: Bloodborne (Video Game)
Genre: Blood and Gore, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Death, Ero Guro, Erotica, Fire, Funeral Pyre, Gen, Lovecraftian, Old Gods, Pain, Pthumerians, Purity, Pyromania, Rituals, Sacrifice, Self-Indulgent, Suffering, Torture, Virginity, Weird, burned alive, cosmic horror, flaying, great ones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-27
Updated: 2021-01-27
Packaged: 2021-03-12 23:48:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,172
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29019222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/garylovesjohn/pseuds/garylovesjohn
Summary: The ascension of a Pthumerian saint.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	Pthumerian Barbecue

**Author's Note:**

> Don't be fooled by the humouristic title, horrific content follows.  
> Only proceed if you're horny for fire.

Today was the day. Or perhaps the night. The Pthumerians living underground had a different sense of time than the Yharnamites above. Away from the light, they slept whenever they felt tired, they ate whenever they felt hungry. No one had the same schedule. Everyone did as they pleased.

But they had their own way to tell when the time was special.

A time of perfect cosmic conjuncture.

The Pthumerians could feel it welling from within. Always barefoot to keep in contact with the telluric forces of the planet, which they believed to be a Great One in itself. They had felt something brewing for long and now, at last, the powers that be were at their very apex.

And so, heeding the call, a Pthumerian saint arose from his resting grave.

All his life had led to this moment. He had spent his undying years training for this, body and soul. The great art of pyromancy had revealed itself to him and he had mastered it. He had trained in ways of the blade with the finest soldiers of Ihyll.

And now, the Great Ones were beckoning him.

He donned his frayed black robes and attached his sheathed sword to his belt.

And thus he began his travel deeper and deeper within the great underground city. All the way down to the very bottom, where the gravestone of Isz awaited.

Each step he took, he could feel the earth resonating below, invigorating his emaciated body. The air felt electric as if before a storm.

The further he ventured, the more pilgrims joined him in his march, wishing to witness his great ascension. Such an event was rare indeed. They all could feel it. They all knew. As if the cosmos had granted them some sort of hivemind for this auspicious occasion.

After a lengthy journey to the belly of the earth, he and his followers arrived at the tomb of the Great Ones. There a crowd had already gathered expectantly.

He had long been awaited.

Baneful chants were sung by maidens and madmen alike, resonating within the stone halls, making the ground shake. For when one voice rose, all of Pthumeru joined the choir, whether they were spectating or not.

Ritualists took him aside to a room where they would prepare him for the event.

Incense burned thick in a suffocating smoke, masking the stench of decay with its strange sweetness.

His sword was taken and reverently placed upon a nearby altar for safekeeping. He would recuperate it later should he pass the Great Ones' test.

Then he was carefully disrobed, bared before the unseen gods.

With tenderness and love, his long raven hair was brushed and tressed before being cut short in one swift move of a razor-sharp dagger. It would be kept as a relic to be worshipped for all eternity. Enshrined with the numerous eclectic treasures that the Pthumerians amassed in the name of the numerous deities they so reverently worshipped. The hair of a saint was considered one of their most precious offerings.

After this was done, the ritualists brought sacred oil scented with coldblood flowers. Gently, their old, gnarled hands rubbed it over every inch of his body.

Although he remained stoic under their ministrations, rarely had he been touched before, and thus it was a bizarre experience. His virgin nerves were ticklish, easily roused. The warm oil felt good. The massage soothing him after a lengthy journey.

From head to toes, he was carefully anointed, leaving his alabaster skin glistening in the candlelights.

Then the flesh on his back was carved with a twisted athamé. An ancient spell written into his body. A prayer to the Great Ones to accept him and grant him the utmost honour to be reborn as their servant.

He uttered not a sound when the cold steel was taken to his exposed skin. The pain of the cuts simply brought him closer to the grand ecstasy that he had sought from the very beginning.

His blood was collected into a golden paten. Pthumerians being granted the gift of immortality, their blood never coagulated, and thus was always fresh to be used in various rites. The very life essence of a saint was reserved for the greatest of spells.

At last, he was ready.

Escorted outside by the ritualists, he was greeted by the sight of an unlit pyre. His final destination where he would finally be faced with the Great Ones and see if he was worthy of their boon.

Strong knights helped him climb over the dry wood so he could stand at the very centre of the blaze. Some of his fellow Pthumerians willingly sat amidst the logs, ready to burn alongside a saint. Such an honour to depart from this world during one of their holiest rituals. To finally be united with the gods while their terrestrial remains would only serve to strengthen their newly appointed servant.

He watched as the elder approached, holding a great rod of sacred fire.

Now was his final test. He had to stand within the flames. He could not move. He could not scream. If he faltered, he would prove himself to be unworthy.

He had to be strong.

Taking a deep breath, basking in his final moment, he held his arms at an angle. The left one at twelve, the right one at three, then slowly switching sides, signifying his passage.

As above, so below.

This was the signal.

The pyre was lit.

He kept his black eyes fixated upon the immense gravestone of Isz before him. He would not look elsewhere.

He could not see how fast the fire spread, but he could already feel the heat upon his toes.

He resisted the urge to curl them away from the increasing pain.

He heard the plaintive wails of the willing sacrifices. The choking from the thick black smoke.

It began to make his eyes water and he blinked his tears away, but still he would not yield. His lungs burned, not from the heat, but from the dryness of it all. From the oxygen being sucked right out of them by the hungering flames.

His feet were torturing him now but, deep down, he rejoiced. The smoke had not made him faint. The pain had not made him scream. He was holding on.

He felt the agonizing lick of fire climbing up his legs. He could no longer feel his feet anymore, they had been thoroughly roasted. The stench of singed flesh mingled with that of the burning wood.

The oil upon his skin only fed the flames, encouraging them to climb further up. The heat shrank his epidermis into taut, blackened leather, splitting here and there. His blood came bubbling out of his veins and fizzed in the scorching heat.

His manhood, untouched, never knowing another's flesh, was consumed by the flames, ravenous as they were. In essence, this pyre was also the first lover he knew. The agony, white hot and unyielding, as searing hands made love to his tender flesh.

Soon, the inferno took his sight away. He could feel his eyes boiling from the inside until they popped from the increased pressure and leaked upon his face.

The pain was indescribable. Far worse than he could have ever expected. The urge to recoil away was great.

However, even if he had wanted to move now, he couldn't. His tendons had melted and fused together. He was stuck like this, merely a charred statue where flesh and bones were one.

In no time, the dancing fire had completely engulfed him. The crowd could no longer discern his shape atop the roaring pyre. The rise in temperature was so tremendous that everyone took their distance from it.

Still, they looked on in utter reverence, chanting and praying.

Anyone would have been long dead by now.

But he wasn't.

He had held on. He had proved himself.

And he felt the Great Ones' acceptance wash over him like the greatest bliss.

The sacred flames were now but a comforting shell around him. His nerve endings burned away leaving only the sweet, rapturous embrace of the gods.

The fire filled him. Penetrating his very soul. He who had remained chaste and virtuous for all his life, he was now experiencing pleasure beyond understanding. A burning climax as he became something far greater than he once was. A sensation only reserved for those most beloved by the Great Ones. They were one with the flame and the flame was one with him.

Purified, body and soul, freed from this sinful flesh. Emasculated and perfected. Freed from temptations. Freed from blood starvation.

Had he had any tear ducts left, he would have cried from joy.

However, though he had run dry, his sight did return. Granted new eyes, restored by the fire. His hollow orbits now incandescent.

He could see so much more now. The cosmos revealed itself to him. Its arcane secrets. Its grandiose designs.

His people were chosen. They were favoured amongst all. And this knowledge only further strengthened his resolve to protect the greatness of Ihyll and its lords.

His mind travelling to the dark recesses of the universe. Exploring a multitude of worlds and all of their possibilities. All the dreams and nightmares converging into unity.

It was too immense for him to fully comprehend.

Even the Great Ones he worshipped were less than dust. Parasites, so small they were invisible, of far more wondrous beings.

To have witnessed one's complete insignificance might have driven another mad, but not a Pthumerian. No, the knowledge of irrelevance was liberating. They had always known, deep down, that if they themselves were so tiny to their gods, then their gods must also have been tiny compared to others.

It was comforting to know that there was no end. No limit. The cosmos expanded forever beyond their wildest dreams.

To make eternal life worthwhile, one has to strive for a grand purpose with no true finite goal.

The blessing of immortality had not been in vain. For even the smallest ripple in the fabric of reality could cause a monumental unravelling. Something microscopic could cause everything to come tumbling down. Just like they had undone their rivals in Loran with the old blood. Just like they were currently doing in Yharnam.

Little by little, they were chipping away at their task.

The eldritch Truth.

Complete entropy.

He felt an eternity pass and awoke much wiser than he could ever hope to be. Although his cosmic travels had seemed to last for several lifetimes, he had only been unconscious for a couple moons.

After the pyre had burned down, they had entombed him in a golden coffin filled with blood. Turning his dried, useless husk back into a functioning body through ancient arcane rites. 

While he had slumbered, his rehydrated skin was degloved and tanned, leaving only bare muscles behind.

Reinvigorated, as soon as he stirred in the waking world, the fire he hosted within reignited and caused everything around him to boil and burn. The ritualists had put him in an enclosed room for this very reason.

His power needed to be contained.

Sensing his awakening, the Shadows came for him. The highest ranking of the keepers, tasked with guarding the Queen of Ihyll herself. They were the only ones able to withstand the uncontrolled flames.

They too, had undergone the very same ritual of incineration as he had. However, they had left nothing behind. The holiest of saints, their physical form had been pulverized, making them invisible. Ascended angels in unity with the gods for all eternity. As formless as the great Oedon himself.

It was an honour to be attended by them.

During his extended coma, the finest blacksmiths of Ihyll had crafted an armour for him. Using his blackened skin as leather as well as ashes and bones from the pyre. A special garment inscribed with runes and spells on the inside.

With care and reverence, he was suited within. Instantly, the armour bit into his flesh, merging with him. His skin reattached itself and now he was one with the very pyre which had granted him his ascension.

A carved, six-eyed skull mask veiled his face but did not conceal the fire raging within. A grim warning to those that would dare intrude upon the tomb of the gods.

Humble, he took a knee as he was given his sword once again. It felt much lighter now, strong as he had become.

His burning soul contained, he could now freely walk out.

Once again, he was welcomed by the very same crowd that had witnessed his great becoming. His sanctity forever cemented in the eyes of everyone.

Even Queen Yharnam herself came to greet him. An elegant curtsy, acknowledging him as a tried and true saint. A guardian of Ihyll and its secrets.

A lifetime effort rewarded with one of the highest honours.

From now, and for all eternity, he was a keeper of the old lords.


End file.
